Hendrick Motorsports is somehow both the calmest ship in the storm and the one quietly adding new sails. For the fifth straight year, Rick Hendrick opened the season with the same Cup quartet: Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, William Byron, and Alex Bowman. The stability got an extra bolt when Byron signed a four-year extension through 2029, even as the team expands its talent pipeline with a splashy No. 17 Xfinity program that mixes its Cup stars with teen phenom Corey Day under crew chief Adam Wall. If the Cup stays steady, the real intrigue shifts to how Hendrick deploys its Xfinity bench in the second half of 2025 and into 2026.

On the other hand, 23XI Racing’s 2025 campaign has been a study of volatility and grit. The headline came at Indianapolis, where Bubba Wallace excelled in a nerve-

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